


Open

by orphan_account



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: 3x18, Angst, F/M, Originally Posted on Tumblr, felicity flatlines, hospital fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-25
Updated: 2015-02-25
Packaged: 2018-03-15 05:40:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 686
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3435527
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>How long does it take to break Oliver Queen down to nothing?</p><p>Five seconds. Five unthinkable seconds.</p><p>Five seconds without Felicity Smoak.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Open

**Author's Note:**

> When I wrote this and put it up on Tumblr, I had no idea how amazing the reaction would be. This is probably the saddest fic I have ever written, but also probably one of my best. The title is inspired by the song Open by Regina Spektor. 
> 
> Oh, there's also a matching gifset that the amazing dumplingnooona made!

Link to the gifset [here](http://dumplingnooona.tumblr.com/post/111983049560/he-sits-there-staring-at-her-he-doesnt-want-to).

 

He sits there, staring at her. He doesn’t want to cry but he knows he might, right here and now. Her normally bright pink lips are pale and dull, cheeks ashen. This alone terrifies him. He hates seeing her like this. Her heartbeat is weak but steady.

It’s nearly dusk when it happens.

His face is in his hands, the slow beep of her heartbeat suddenly changes to a single, steady note, blaring in his ears. There’s nothing there but a single flat line. Her heart has stopped, and Oliver feels like his own heart has stopped.

 

**One**

He walks into her office, a vague memory somewhere in there of a blonde who made him smile. She makes him smile again. She has the most adorable smile. She knows he’s lying to her. He has the worst lies. She’s an assistant. A helper. A friend. A crush.

No, not a crush.

She has a crush on him. And it’s precious. She is precious and strong and lovely. She reminds him how to be himself again.

Yes, a crush.

 

**Two**

Her crush on him is obvious. He tries not to think about his own crush on her. He tries not to think about her every time he even glances about her. He wishes it was different. He sleeps with Isabel. They both know it’s a mistake. He regrets it. She’s hurt and he tries to comfort her, tries to let her know that he can’t be with someone he sees as a person. She is one of the few he sees as a person. She is his person.

It’s heart wrenching, setting her up as bait for Slade, seeing the look on her face when she realizes that it’s nothing more than a plan. She thinks it’s a lie.

It’s not.

He wants to tell her there on the beach. He wants to kiss her, really kiss her. But he’s not sure he’s ready. He’s not sure she’s ready.

He wants to be.

 

**Three**

He’s finally asking her out on a date. He can’t stand to be away from her. He wants this, and so does she. And for a brief moment, he thinks that he might be happy. That they might be happy.

But then he’s cradling her body in his arms, her head bleeding, the perfection that was their first real date ruined by an explosion, and not the explosion he’d been hoping for that night.

He’s kissing her. And it’s perfect and heartbreaking all at once. She walks away, and Oliver knows that he’s gone. He loves her, and it hurts.

Oliver doesn’t sleep that night. He keeps seeing Felicity in front of him. In his dreams she doesn’t wake up and he’s holding her as she dies.

 

**Four**

He loves her.

He tells her.

He dies.

He dreams of her.

He dies again in his dreams.

Is death the only ending for them?

 

**Five**

She doesn’t want to be a woman he loves. She can’t believe he’s working with a killer like Malcolm. Oliver can’t either. He doesn’t want to, but he has to. He thinks he has to.

But now Oliver isn’t so sure. He blames Ray, yes. But he also blames himself. He’d hoped by letting her go that she’d be safer. He’d trusted that it would be true, otherwise he’d been the fool and and ruined things with the woman he loves. Loved.

There’s a second beep. Her heart has started again. Oliver breathes, not realizing that he’d been holding his breath. He’s shaking. She’s still unconscious, but her heart is beating.

Oliver cries.

He can’t do this anymore. He’s lost too many people. He can’t lose Felicity, too. Not more than he already has.

In that moment he realizes, without Felicity, he’s lost too.

Five seconds, he lost her. Five seconds, he lost himself. Five seconds and he is broken.

And yet something within him understands that he needs to do whatever it takes to love her, to have her, to keep her.

Because there is no Arrow, no Oliver Queen, without Felicity Smoak.


End file.
